Taiwan seems have put a halt to its problem of import player turnover.
Instead, fans are seeing the same faces on the pitching mound year after year.
The four North American and Latin pitchers in the Chinese Professional Baseball League this season year have a combined 15 years of experience in the league.
The dean of the pitching quartet is Osvaldo Martinez, who began his sixth season in Taiwan when the Chinese Professional Baseball League began play on March 8.
Spending all his years with the Sinon Bulls, Martinez is now just a year short of applying for Taiwan permanent residency.
Next in seniority is Lino Rivera, whose fifth season in Taiwan is off to a rocky start at 0-2 (7.64) with the often impatient President Lions.
Jonathan Hurst returned to Brother for his fourth season in Taiwan, after spending last season in Japan with the Yakult Swallows.
Hurst is off to a fast start, winning all three of his starts with a 0.75 ERA.
John Burgos is also beginning his fourth campaign in Taiwan. He returns to the Lions after leading the league last season with 18 wins.
The rival Taiwan Major League meanwhile kicked off their season on March 23 with Dave Hilton at the helm of the Chiayi Luka.
Imports on his roster include pitcher Greg Bicknell, and Australian position players Gavin Fingleson and Matt Buckley.
Fingleson batted .269 with four stolen bases for Australia in last year's Baseball World Cup in Taiwan.
Hilton managed the Luka in 1999. Last season, Chiayi won only once in their final 26 games to finish the season 13-47 -- the worst record ever for a Taiwan pro baseball team.
Fingleson and Buckley were on last season's Chiayi team, until they were cut to make room for import pitchers -- a move which was seen as contributing to Luka's free fall.
Fingleson showed that he he belonged in Taiwan, however, returning to the island for the Baseball World Cup last year, batting .269 with four stolen bases for Team Australia.
SS Lazio on Monday fired the far-right sympathizer who handles their eagle mascot after he posted online a series of videos and pictures of his erect penis. Falconer Juan Bernabe, who has been present at Lazio home matches with Olimpia the eagle since the 2010-2011 season, posted the footage on social media after having surgery on Saturday to implant a penile prosthesis to improve his sexual performance. Lazio said that they had “terminated, with immediate effect” their relationship with Bernabe “due to the seriousness of his conduct,” adding that they were “shocked” by the images. The Serie A club added that Bernabe’s dismissal
The NHL postponed the Los Angeles Kings’ home game against the Calgary Flames on Wednesday with several massive wildfires burning across the greater Los Angeles area. The Kings and Flames were scheduled to play on Wednesday night at the Kings’ downtown arena. The NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers were scheduled to host the Charlotte Hornets in the same arena last night. “Our hearts are with our entire Los Angeles community,” the Kings said in a statement. “We appreciate the hard working first responders who are diligently working to contain the fire and protect our community. We appreciate the league’s support in keeping our
Doping fears prevented former US Open champion Emma Raducanu from treating insect bites on the eve of the Australian Open, she said, with players increasingly wary about ingesting contaminated substances. The British player was speaking in the wake of high-profile doping cases involving Iga Swiatak and Jannik Sinner. “I would say all of us are probably quite sensitive to what we take on board, what we use,” the 22-year-old said, recalling an incident on Friday. “I got really badly bitten by, I don’t know what, like ants, mosquitoes, something. I’m allergic, I guess,” she added. The bites “flared up and swelled up really a
TWO IN A WEEK: Despite an undefeated start to the year playing alongside Jiang Xinyu of China, Wu Fang-hsien is to play the Australian Open with a Russian partner Taiwan’s Wu Fang-hsien yesterday triumphed at the Hobart International, winning the women’s doubles title at the US$275,094 outdoor hard-court tournament, while McCartney Kessler lifted the trophy in the women’s singles. Fourth-ranked Wu and partner Jiang Xinyu of China took 1 hour, 15 minutes to defeat Romania’s Monica Niculescu and Fanny Stollar of Hungary, 6-1, 7-6 (8/6) at the Hobart International Tennis Centre, their second title in a week. Wu and Jiang on Sunday won the women’s doubles title at the ASB Classic in Auckland, beating Serbia’s Aleksandra Krunic and Sabrina Santamaria of the US. Their winning ways continued in Australia as they stretched
RSS